Fire & Ice

Matanuska Glacier Chugach Mountain RangeAlaska, USA

My father's father was a simple man of the world. And his father's father was a Texas Ranger, so the family story goes. At one point in my life I was a southbound child with a simple life. I eventually turned out alright, probably because of living a simple life. Most self-made people I’ve ever known are humble and simple people who I have come to admire and adore.

You can go for my jugular vein and take my life, you can take my ‘stuff’ – it is after all just ‘stuff’; but you can’t take my gift because it’s not yours to take. Life has been like Fire and sometimes like Ice, HOT … COLD and cycles again. I wouldn’t have had it any other way; talk about exciting!

There’s not much like the sound of crampons on glacier ice, scrambling up, over, and onto a very shear slice of ice to witness something like this unfold at dawn's first light. The moment caused me to reflect on my existence and I wondered if there’s a point in life when you’ve seen so much you begin to wonder what other plans you can make.

One eventually realizes…you’re not alone, playing in the sandbox of time, so put the fire out in your head and be with me tonight. It’ll be like Fire & Ice.